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What Latinos Should Know About Assisted Suicide

Too often these days, really bad ideas are sold to voters under the cover of compassion. This is certainly the case with measures like the one on the ballot in Colorado for assisted suicide.

Soon voters there will be confronted by this hot-button issue that is sweeping the country. Latinos need to approach the issues with great care, as the built-in downsides of these laws are more likely to negatively impact the poor and marginalized than the comfortably well-off – and Colorado has a large Latino population who suffer from a poverty rate double that of non-Hispanic whites.

On the assisted suicide issue, the best illustration may be a recent case out of California, a state which legalized physician-assisted suicide just last June. Stephanie, a young wife and mother of four with a terminal illness, was suddenly denied a new round of life-prolonging chemotherapy by her insurance company just after the law was passed. They would pay for suicide drugs, with a small co-pay of $1.20. The short documentary she made about her experience is well-worth watching, not least in order to be inspired by her noble courage.